Sex determination: Three scan centres sealed in Namakkal

Officials of the directorate of medical and rural health services (DMS) on Monday sealed three scan centres and booked cases against three doctors in Namakkal for sex determination.TNN | November 23, 2016, 08:34 IST

Representative image.Officials of the directorate of medical and rural health services (DMS) on Monday sealed three scan centres and booked cases against three doctors in Namakkal for sex determination.

For the first time in recent years, the health department had engaged three pregnant women as decoys to trap doctors violating the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PCPNDT) Act, 1994, which prohibits sex determination. On Monday, a team of investigators, including health department officials, senior doctors and police seized ultrasound machines and booked cases against Dr K Kannagi from Kumaran Polyclinic, Dr Kala Devi from Sri Scan Centre and Dr Meghala from Ganga Hospital in Namakkal.

"The doctors at the clinics accepted money and scanned the women, but made no entries in the register. They did not give certificates to patients and deleted images from the scanning machines. The money we sent through the decoys were in their cash box," said Tiruvallur joint director D Mohanan, who was part of the investigative team.

"Experts in our team pulled out the log from the ultrasound machines. One centre had collected an additional 500 because the foetus was male," he said.

On Tuesday, the team filed a case against Dr Viramani of Viram Hospitals when they found that the hospital did not maintain medical records as mandated by the Act.

They estimate that these centres scanned at least 100 pregnant women a week and were catering to neighbouring districts. The sex ratio in Namakkal, according to the state's Health Management Information System (HMIS), has dropped from 868 girls per 1,000 boys in 2014-2015 to 835 girls per 1,000 boys in 2016-17.

For some years now, data on the state's sex ratio at birth has been worrying policy makers and activists. The 'vital statistics' released by the office of the registrar general, ministry of home affairs, showed the state's sex ratio at birth to be 853 - a 45-point decline from 2013. It was worse in districts like Perambalur, Pudukottai, Tiruvarur and Nagapattinam where the sex ratio was below 750.

Records maintained by the state health department haven't shown any significant improvement in certain districts. In 2014, a clinic run by a private physician Dr K Ramachandran in Neyveli was closed down, leading to an increase in sex ratio at birth in Cuddalore, Namakkal, Ariyalur and Perambur. This year, the sex ratio in Ariyalur is 972 compared to 942 in 2014. During the same period in Cuddalore, it jumped from 846 to 897.

"Many people were travelling from faraway places for sex determination. They would then undergo abortion in the same clinic or go to a quack. Sometimes, they would pop in a pill. Whenever doctors at government hospitals received pregnant women complaining of abnormal bleeding, they would alert our team. We gathered information about many such clinics," said director of medical services Dr N Senguttuvan.

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